Anthony Bacon (British Army officer)

Major General Anthony Bacon (1796–2 July 1864) was a notable cavalry officer and commander in the Napoleonic wars.

Bacon was born at Llandaff in Glamorgan, the son of Anthony Bushby Bacon (1772–1827) of Elcot Park at Kintbury and Benham Park at Marsh Benham in Speen near Newbury in Berkshire, one of the richest commoners in England. The younger Bacon was educated at Eton College

Bacon's grandparents were Anthony Bacon (1718–1786), the industrialist, and his mistress Mary Bushby, of Gloucestershire. This Bacon was a notable ironmaster and colliery owner in Wales who made Merthyr Tydfil the iron-smelting centre of Great Britain, was one of the richest men of his time. However, the sons showed little or no interest in their father's businesses and rapidly sold or leased them to men such as Richard Crawshay, who was one of the witnesses to the father's will. This included the mineral rights at Cyfarthfa.

General Bacon's sister Emily married 1835 a wealthy landowner Lt. Col. Thomas Peers Williams (1795–1875), MP for Great Marlow 1820–1868 and Father of the House of Commons December 1867–1868; several of their daughters, and therefore Bacon's nieces, married into the Peerage.

Despite his father's great fortune, Bacon had the habit of high living. This was attributed by Dodge (reviewing a book) to the father's habit of refusing to give the son a regular allowance and paying his debts. Unfortunately, in 1823, he married an expensive wife in Lady Charlotte Harley. Either this couple or the father dissipated the elder Anthony Bacon's fortune; in 1827, when the father died, his estate was discovered to be heavily encumbered. Bacon was ruined, and in November 1829 actually imprisoned for debt.

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